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The first step into the unknown

Subject Post 1Subject: The first step into the unknown Sun May 22, 2016 10:50 pm

Uprising Spark

Thea

Sifer

Song: Ilias Final Form - Artist: MGQ OST - Words: 990

The entrance to the forest, to what would be the rest of her life, loomed in front of Thea. The trees seemed to reach up into the sky itself, easily towering over any of the buildings that she was leaving behind. The closeness of the branches causing her path to darken as it moved into the woods. She turned her head, and gave a last look towards the town she had grown up in. The small wooden house fuming out smoke from burning fires, people walking back and forth going about their daily business, and the sun shining down onto the roof of the town's local library, the place where her life truly started. She griped onto the which she was taking with her, the book which first introduced her to the world of Chi, and the book which she had studied from for the past twelve years. The weight of what she was about to do did not escape her, in this town show was safe, in her future she was almost certainly dead.However, she couldn’t allow that to hold her back from what she knew was her path in life.

After a few more seconds of staring at people walking by, she finally turned her back to the forest. With the acceptance that this was the only way to achieve what she needs implanted into her mind she took the first step into the forest. With each step she took into the woods she could feel the light of the town leaving her body, and the shade from the packed trees covering her form, After about a minute of walking the shadows had completely covered up her body. The town could no longer be seen, and only the sounds of the forest could be heard. She continued to walk forward as best she could in the darkness, avoiding the long poles of black which were certainly the trees that were trying to get in her way. The sounds of rustling leaves due to wind, or the movement of animals accompanied her walk. The birds chirping freely above head, flying somewhere in the skies which were invisible to her.

She kept walking for a solid hour, making sure to be careful where she stepped to avoid any of the terrible things that could ruin the only clothes she brought with her. Her pace did not slow for an hour, her breathing remaining steady as she seemed to be mentally preparing herself for what came next. She figured that by this point she must have been around three or four miles into the forest. She moved over to one of the towering shadows that she had been seeing for this entire journey, and began to smile. This was the moment that would decide if she was going to be able to achieve everything she wished for in life, or if she was just going to be the next meal in some oblivious creatures stomach. Closing her eyes she let her chi begin to flow freely from her body.

The moment she started to do this there was an audible shift in the forest. Even this minute change in the life energy around them was enough to scare off the smaller woodland creatures, the birds not wishing to fly to close either. This left Thea in a near perfect silence, the only sound she could hear was her own heart beating, and her slowly breathing in and out. She could almost swear that each groove the rather tough bark under her hand had felt more defined as she was exuding Chi. She also knew the next thing she would do was where it might become a bit harder, and would actually have the chance of getting her killed.

She knew that just exuding chi would make her seem like a large animal, or something that happened to have a decent amount of life about them. What she needed to do was show that the chi was coming from something that was worth more of a look then your average lively beast. She slowly closed her chi producing nodes, tightening them to the point that the chi they were producing would be dimmed to a level quite a bit under that of a normal human, She then released the nodes, allowing them to exude chi freely once more. This would cause what might seem to some to be tides of life originating from one point. After letting her chi produce normally for a few seconds she once more tightened her valves.

She did this pattern over and over, tightening, and then releasing in an attempt to draw something that could sense chi to her location. After a few minutes of this her changes in the tides would start to match to her breathing. Wave after wave of chi washing over everything around her as she placed all of her focus on maintaining the methodic flow. She would continues to produce her signal like this until one of four things happened. She would either one, get exhausted by the production which would take about two more hours of doing this. She would two, get sense by some kind of creature that loved to kill things that were producing chi like she was, or three, get sensed by something that would be interested by someone that knew how to handle chi. This third option was the one she was banking her entire future on, and the hope that whoever was interested enough to come to her would also be good enough at handling energy to teach her more. The fourth option was that another intelligent being came by that could sense chi, and then that being killed her. A twenty-five percent chance of achieving her goal was still much better then a zero percent chance of achieving her dreams, so she did not let the small chance of this working interrupt her production.

Subject Post 2Subject: Re: The first step into the unknown Sun May 22, 2016 11:32 pm

Artist: Mogeko Castle - Song: MaouDamashii Town 10 - Word Count:

Kamui's motives and decision making patterns were often a mystery even to him. The overarching plan wasn't exactly a mystery. He had his dominoes in line, he knew where he was going to move Sasha, he knew where he was going to move Shi, he knew which pawns needed to occupy which space, but actually knowing what the spaces themselves were was something that required research. However, actually deciding to assign something in Japan itself was the questionable decision. Japan itself was the last bastion of human civilization that hadn't been marred by the rampaging dick waving of various supernatural beings. That made it more secure and a great place to live...much less a great place to start laying groundwork if you wanted it to be undetected. Still though, Kamui was nothing if not patient and incredibly thorough. He wasn't going to write off any location without so much as giving it a cursory once over. He was not let down either, something interesting WOULD in fact happen from his little venture, just not what he was expecting to happen.

The place was too secure, he had decided that pretty early upon his intrusion but had, again, been rather thorough in his research and he had just finished exhausting all hope of using this territory and Japan in general. Then he noticed something that was simultaneously strange and very idiotic. There was a human, maybe forty meters off from his position that, it seemed, was either having a lot of trouble properly utilizing her Yizhi or a lot of trouble controlling her Tilan. Kamui had maintained his Yizhi through his entire little jaunt through Shadin-land and it had gone a long way in maintaining his secrecy in this adventure, so there was very little chance whoever was causing this had noticed him, which meant they probably were not much of a threat. He should have probably just ignored the creature, however he was frustrated at how fruitless this adventure turned out to be and this was, unfortunately, the first semi-interesting thing that had happened yet. Japan was so boring.

It did not take him especially long to track down his quarry he was a ridiculously fast creature and forty meters stops sounding like much when you begin to be able to jog around the speed of sound. He stayed nearby, using that lovely forest green foliage for cover as he watched what was a smaller, cute, girl seemingly trying to jettison her energy through the forest. Kamui couldn't be sure what exactly she was doing. Originally, he had thought she was trying to develop some form of Chi-based Sonar which while not impossible was somewhat redundant when their own natural abilities produced a more effective form of gleaning the same information. So what was she doing? Sending some kind of tracking signal? Was she so incompetent she couldn't contain her energy? Maybe she was just trying to die? Kamui was struggling to glean the information from just watching her, but thankfully humans had long since developed the ability to ask each other stupid questions, second only to their ability to display pictures of their breakfast to thousands of faceless strangers. For now he'd open with the question, they could discuss breakfast later.

"So are you trying to send the worlds most desperate SOS signal or are you trying your best to get eaten?"

Kamui had walked out of his lovely little green camouflage before setting himself down on his rump by a tree as if he owned this particular patch of rich, bug infested nature. That sense of confidence was just something that seemed to flow off of him in waves, not all that dissimilar than the pulses of Chi she had been flinging through the forest. The body language was calculated however, everything Kamui did tended to be. The act of sitting down, despite being more comfortable than standing, was a sort of obvious sign that he meant little to no harm to her. Attacking over a distance from a sitting position was still difficult, even if their mere existence tended to spit in the face of physics. In addition, it also let the girl know that she, too, was not a threat at all. Who would sit next to something they were wary of without societal pressures making you sit next to that kid in class riddled with body odor issues?

"If you're trying to get eaten, you're off to a bad start. Hollows tend to prefer Reiatsu to Chi, the big ones also tend to avoid Japan. This place is far too safe to pull off Hollow assisted suicide. Fast food induced diabetic comas would be a quicker route to take than a hollow attack if you wanted to kill yourself. I recommend Mc-Demons. I heard the McRib is coming back."

He hadn't been able to succeed at what he came here for, but he'd probably be able to play with a new toy for a little while at the very least. Worst case scenario was that she was boring and he left anyway, as disappointed as he was five minutes ago. If she did prove interesting however, he would at least get an enjoyable little distraction out of it, maybe he could take her home as a gift for Sasha. She seemed to like collecting wayward lost children. Or...maybe she just liked annoying Kamui, he wasn't very sure with that woman. She was something of a jerk. Fitting, but still quite rude.

By the time that Thea’s visitor had joined the picture, she had already been sending off differing waves of chi for an hour. This meant that she had been rather focused on her task when she heard the voice from behind her. Her body jolted a small bit, but she stopped herself from looking over to who was talking just yet, Based on what the being was saying they were able to see what she was doing with her chi, which also meant that they were the type of person she had been using her waves to find.

She didn’t want to make a bad impression on the person who may lead her into getting a rather large amount of knowledge. With her free hand she straightened her bow-tie, and her book carrying hand was used to brush off the few pieces of leaf, and dirt which had fallen onto her jacket. She then returned her chi production to its normal state, of just barely above the human average. With these small preparations finished she turned to face the one who had answered her call.

Her eyes scanned over the man in front of her, and he had to admit to herself that she wasn’t what she had been expecting. Her expectation had been more along the lines of the images in her book, bald monks who were demonstrating chi, and the different methods of mediation. Still she knew that his appearance did not necessarily relate to the man’s powers.She also understood that her own appearance did not make one immediately think of either researcher, or a user of chi. With these judgments settled in her mind she took a step towards the man. She made sure to stay quiet,and smile when he spoke about the easier ways for her to die, not wanting to lose what would be her only chance at achieving her goal.

“I’d have to suppose that an SOS signal would be the closest thing to what I was attempting to do. I was trying to vary my chi in such a way that someone who would be able to sense it, in this case you, would come to find what was at the source.”

Her free, and unadorned hand moved up to her neck, readjusting her bow-tie as the reality that a single wrong movement could cause her to lose the chance of living the life she knew she had to started to set in. Even with her mental preparations facing down your destiny was not something most humans could do without feeling a little bit nervous. Plus, judging by the fact that the man thought she was trying to get killed he might not yet think very highly of her, or her abilities. This small scene of nerves would last, but a second before she would start to continue on with her introduction. It was now or never, and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity vanish without doing the best she could to seize hold of it.

“I do understand that this may not seem like the smartest idea, but in my eyes I had no other choice. Since the age of five I have been trying to learn about Chi from this book. I have spent twelve years first learning how to read, and then trying to actually use what this book has offered. Only in the past five have I seen any true progress, and what I have been able to do boils down to exuding my chi, restraining it, or pushing it into my vision. At the rate I am currently progressing it would take an entire life span to truly master the techniques laid forth by this book.”

At this point of her speaking, her grip on the book would tighten. The edges of her smile showing signs that her teeth were being pushed against each other with the slightest amount of force. She stopped looking at where the man was sitting, and instead focused her eyes onto his. Her voice picked up a hint of the passion, and what might have been tints of anger that she was feeling while she spoke of her life, and of her goal.

“I can not allow this. My goal in life is to learn everything this world has to offer, and if it would take me a lifespan just to master one small section of this world then I may as well not have been born. I can’t learn as fast as I need to from a single book, and even if I gained some grand understanding over Chi, I would have to start from ground zero once more when it came to the next type of energy for me to conquer.. This all results in one conclusion. I need someone who will be able to guide me to mastering these different techniques, to controlling chi, and then everything else. I need someone like you who knows more than I do about the things I have been dabbling in to be able to even have a chance of reaching my goal of total knowledge.”

She was done speaking, having said everything that she could on just what she was doing. She continued to stare down the man as everything she was, and would be depended on what he would reply to her with. If he refused to show her a path to learning these things quicker, then she may as well have come out here to end her life.

Subject Post 4Subject: Re: The first step into the unknown Sun May 29, 2016 6:47 pm

Artist: Mogeko Castle - Song: MaouDamashii Town 10 - Word Count:

Kamui finished his casual walk out in to her little clearing before plopping himself down on the soft grass, watching as the girl began her story. It was always interesting to him how people decided to present themselves. Any identity, even genuine ones, always begin as a mask. There is a very specific portrayal that everyone utilizes upon first interaction. The way you position your hands, the look on your face, the way you stand, the timbre of your voice...all of it is dedicated to painting the picture you think will be the most favorable for you. For most people, this is subconscious. Societal conditioning causes you to do it on your own without actually dedicating thought to it. It was with that in mind that he always got so confused by the subconscious decision making process that led people to talk entirely about themselves when trying to get something they want out of someone else.

Kamui was an unchanging mask of indifference as the girl spoke, choosing to just watch as she spoke. Unfortunately for her, she spoke almost entirely about herself...except nothing about herself that was very useful. If he understood what her overall premise was, she had already assumed that he was well versed in Chi and that she wanted to use him as a pseudo teacher/chi mentor thing. Of course, that was assuming many things, the first of which was correct, Kamui did in fact know how to utilize Chi though what he was capable of was quite different than what the girl would ever be capable of. The second of which was, miraculously, an even bigger leap of faith. It assumed that Kamui was looking for students. He was not.

"You aren't off to a good start. Most people don't look for teachers or students in the middle of a wooded area and for good reason. You can find any number of things out here. Hollows, rapists, axe murderers...you're probably more likely to find a penguin strolling around out here than a teacher."

Even still, if she wasn't lying to him, then actually teaching yourself Chi over the course of a decade with naught but a picture book was something of an impressive feat. He was only where he was at because his father was, effectively, THE Chi human. Not even Kamui was delusional enough to believe he would be where he was without any assistance which in and of itself was enough of a reason to attempt to cultivate worthwhile assets. Unfortunately for Thea, no matter how worthwhile she could be as one of those cultivated assets, she wasn't really the one with the bargaining power here. Thea was going to have to work harder to make Kamui believe she was worth the effort. She was the one who needed something right now, not Kamui.

"Let's say I am able to teach you. Let's say I can shrink those lifetimes of learning in to small condensed little bits for you to digest. Why would I possibly choose to do that? So far you've told me why you want to be educated, but not why I should be inclined to educate you. Because you want to learn? Because you're desperate? Those are usually traits I require in...students...but that isn't nearly enough."

Kamui dragged himself back up to his feet, brushing the grass from his backside. It'd be a fun little game, pushing to see just how far this little girl was willing to go for this. Kamui, for just a moment, let his guise down and allowed his chi to flow from him for maybe a second, but a second would be all it would take for someone like Thea to feel the strength of energy. It'd feel as if the air itself was pressing down on her shoulders, as if gravity cranked up a good couples thousands of a percent and as if the world itself was trying to crush her. Then it would be gone, quick enough that she might even mistake it for her imagination going away from her.

"So give me a reason to think there's enough and I might be able to help you. Sell yourself well."

Thea focused completely on Kamui as he began to speak once more. Her smile only faltered for the briefest of seconds as it seemed like getting a teacher might be a bit harder than she thought. This didn’t harm her resolve any as she had already started to think of ways to sell herself to the man. She would need to find a way to prove that she was actually worth more then getting killed by a hollow, or an axe murderer. Her train of thought was then eradicated as the man pushed forth his energy.

In the brief second that the massive amount of chi was sent forth, Thea had already taken an involuntary step back. She now knew how an ant must have felt when she was sending off her own energy. It was as if life itself had surrounded her body and tried to consume her. Every part of her being was screaming at her that she would die.The beating of her heart had already started to fill her ears simply due to the massive amount of power she had just witnessed. These combined is what really excited her.

“I could have guessed that you were powerful, but that was more than powerful. That was purely amazing. I could feel it around me like a single pebble in the ocean. I never knew a single living being could have that much concentrated power within himself.”

Her eyes were closed as she began to take a few deep breaths, one after the other. Soon enough her heart rate was down to a point where she wasn’t being deafened by her own body. She opened her eyes to look over the man, who had apparently done that impressive burst without even trying, or had enough control over his demeanor that he could keep calm no matter how much energy he ended up expending. At this point neither one would be too much of a surprise to her, and she had a more important thing to worry about. How she was going to convince someone this powerful to take her on as a student.

“I would like to say one thing before I start selling myself to you. Nothing I’ve said to you or will say to you is a lie. I have no reason to lie, and I doubt that I would be able to get one past you. With that said I can in all honesty say that there are two immediate reasons why you would want to take me on as your student. The first is that I am willing to die to learn what I need to. If any of the things you had described had actually come here to kill me, than it would still be better then not being able to achieve what I need to. This also means that if there is anything else you require of me I will do it. No matter how much pain I have to endure, or how hard things may get. The second is that if you teach me, I’ll be strong enough to help you. I don’t know much about you,other than the fact that you have power, but I must assume that you have ambitions in life, and that said ambitions will be much easier to achieve the more people you have with actual power helping you. ”

She stared at Kamui, and waited to see if her reasons were good enough for him, or if he would shoot her down due to them not being good enough. Her face, and the rest of her body, didn’t show any tells that might indicate she was not being honest. The willingness she had to do whatever was needed was what lead her into this forest, what led her to start her true path in life, and would be what guided her if this all worked. All of this brought out one fact clearly in her mind if he didn’t accept her reasons than she would have nothing left to convince him with. She had told everything she knew she had. Her eyes widened a bit as she thought of one more thing which might conceivably help her chances the tiniest bit before he decided on what her destiny would be. This was her life's purpose, and she had to go past what she simply knew she had.

“With all of that said I understand that saying I’m willing to do anything is not the greatest guarantee in the world that what I’m saying is true. So if there is anything you wish for me to do to prove my willingness to you then please say so now.”

The hope behind this statement was that the most powerful being Thea had ever encountered would be impressed by an actual action, rather then just words. This relied on the presumption that he wouldn't just wave off everything she had said, and simply walk off. It also meant that he might just say something that she actually couldn't do yet, like start a fire using only the power of her mind, just so he could get a laugh from this. The fact that he had stayed around this long did give her hope even with her concerns, he wouldn't have stayed if this was a complete waste of his time.

Kamui sat still, reserved in his thoughts and actions for most of her little speech. It wasn't bad, but it was not necessarily good either. The girl wasn't that uninteresting, the endless search for knowledge was something to value, it was something to strive for, it was something that everyone should appreciate...however it certainly was not something unique to her. If he wanted someone who was in constant search for knowledge and power, he could pick a random person off the street. Power was something that everyone in the world today strove for. So many people were monsters, so many people were dangerous, and power, real power, was more of a currency today than it ever had been before in Earth's history. So no, her ambition was not something that he needed, it wasn't something rare or even especially interesting.

"All very impressive, all very generic as well. Your romantic little love affair with the mysteries of the world is great and as much as I don't believe you, the desperation is admirable. Unfortunately you've done a pretty mediocre job of selling yourself. You don't understand the terms of your potential apprenticeship. This isn't necessarily about what I want, it's about what you can do for me. So far it's all been about what I can do for you and I wasn't exactly looking to adopt a child while I was here."

Kamui picked himself up from his seat, dusted himself off and made his way off toward the trees behind him. It was a ceremonious act, he wasn't actually going to leave, at least not without finishing their meeting. Of course, that finish was probably a little more final than young Thea was probably expecting. The girl would have one more chance to sell herself, one more chance to prove some vague value to him, or he was going to kill her, right where she stood. She had seen his face and that was dangerous information to have circulating around these parts of the world. He was either going to take her with him, or she wasn't going anywhere at all. Many of his machinations were entirely dependent on subtlety and deception. The more people that could place him on this island, the more likely his plan could unravel. If she didn't convince him now, she was never going to convince anyone of anything for the rest of her life.

Kamui turned back to her, a look of irritation and boredom on his face as his eyes fell to the ground, a soft sigh leaving him in the process. He turned his eyes back up to her, appearing to try his best to determine just what to do with her. Then he spoke, his voice was level, simultaneously agitated and hopeful, bored yet enthusiastic, an enigma wrapped in a riddle. He hadn't closed the door, but he was making it very clear she was on the last of her chances. He didn't want someone who needed to be told what to do, he didn't want someone he needed to guide by the damn nose. If she wanted anything from him, he wanted conviction, he wanted backbone, and he wanted ingenuity. They weren't things he was going to teach her, he was offering to teach her Chi, not how to be interesting.

Thea could tell that she was starting to wear on Kamui’s patience. This would be her last chance to convince him until this golden opportunity was torn away from her hands due to what she could only consider her own stupidity in how she had been handling this conversation. She needed to tell him something that would show she would be useful. This something was also something that she did not know. Every last idea from her head about how she could be useful had already been used, and she needed to get some new ones fast.

Her body bent backwards a bit, her eyes turning up to both the forest above her, and the sky above that forest. She needed a way to look at her situation that she hadn’t tried before. She began to slowly breath in and out slowly. She was calming herself down, and getting a control over the chi that still remained in her body after having been using it for a while. She took control of this energy inside of her, and began to guide it. To those who could see the flow of chi it would be a rather interesting sight simply due to how effort she appeared to be putting in. From her pores the energy would leak out, and spiral up to her eyes. It would then slowly start covering both of them, going both inside her head, and over the eyes forming a sort of spherical chi contact lenses.

A soft throbbing sensation was starting to slowly occur in the back of her head as she used this technique. Normally with this power she would see the faint trails of chi that come off of living things, the energies that naturally exist, but due to how much chi had been spread around so far by both her, and Kamui all she could see was energy. If she had used this when he had let loose to give her an example of her power, she would have gone blind for a little while at least. Luckily for her the energy had faded enough to not kill her eyes. It was still covering up the other energy that had been put forth by living things throughout the day, even her own. This is what gave her an idea. The constant flow of chi to her eyes that had been keeping her ‘contacts’ up was cut off. Her sight returned to normal, and wide grin on her face. This idea was good enough to work. The headache she had after using so much chi, and a technique that always gave her headaches could be dealt with later.

“You’re right when you say I’m generic. I’ve got some chi powers, but they’re nothing in comparison to what I’ve seen from you so far. Knowing about the kind of things that live in this world I’m barely a blip on a power radar. Sure I could get very powerful eventually, but that’s not now so it’s not all that useful to you. What I can help you with should be something more immediate, my use to you should be something I can do while getting stronger, otherwise you may as well just get someone who is already stronger.”

Her grin wasn’t leaving her face at this point. She had gotten a hold of a way to convince that man in front of her, and was running with it. Not only was she confident that this would work, but she was having fun talking about. No matter what happened after she finished speaking she loved the feeling of getting a new idea.

“Except I’m still interesting a little. I do have chi powers which while not enough to be threatening to anyone yet, they are enough to interest some people. Your powers were probably the same at this point. They aren't at this state now though of course. You’ve advanced, and gone way beyond where I am from what I can tell. Now I’m going to make a rather safe assumption. In getting this power you have lost access to someone, or something. At some point you burnt a bridge with someone you want information on, or the knowledge that they had. Even with all of your power due to the actions you’ve done there must be a place you’ve been barred from you wish to be, or simply a place too dangerous to show yourself again.”

She was saying this rather matter of factly. She didn’t think that it was a bad thing that this had happened, if it had, she simply viewed it as a natural result of the search for knowledge, and power. She was also really hoping that he had needed to this at some point cause if not she was once more in a terrible position. Also even if she didn’t know it she was probably going to get killed if she messed this up.

“I’m an unknown, and boring person. No bridges have been burnt for me yet, and people are probably just interested enough in what I’ll be able to do to let me in. So use me to get into those places that are hard for you to get into now. People have no clue who I am so I can go in, get the knowledge that you couldn’t, or do things you want done in wherever this theoretical place is.”

A laugh, that was the reaction she prompted. It wasn't the familiar one of condescension though. It was throaty, it was hearty, what she had said was genuinely funny. She had succeeded to an extent. She had chosen something that Kamui could genuinely have a use for in her. She managed to choose something that Kamui had in excess at this point, but she had managed to chose something that he could actually use. It was one of the few things that she could have chosen that would have saved her life...and the only one that allowed her to keep her clothes on as well. Kamui let his eyes linger for a few minutes on her, savoring the thought for the briefest of moments inside that debauchery laden mind of his before he started walking toward the girl, giving no indication what he had actually decided to do with her, despite his mind having already been quite made up. He stopped a few inches away from her, ending that same distance away from her whether she attempted to move or not.

"Let's give it a try then, shall we? I have very little use for a spy, agent, or whatever you want to call yourself that's just going to get herself killed. So, we have a test."

Kamui extended his arm and a ball of Chi, roughly the size of a basketball, flickered in to existence before her, seeming to materialize out of thin air with pinpoint control. Even a regular human would notice the intensity that this orb of energy held the same way they'd know that touching a fire was moronic. The energy the girl had circulating through her eyes however would let her see much, much more. The energy output of that ball alone rivaled more than a couple thousand regular humans if you had managed to duct tape their internal energy together and bound it further with spit...the ball was stronger than about a hundred of Thea's current level...facts that would be pretty evident to her. Then the ball condensed further, shrinking to about the size of a baseball. It was then that Kamui outlined the details of this test.

"You need to be both strong, clever, knowledgeable and adaptable, able to shift to new challenges at a moments notice all while maintaining the persona you are playing, maintaining your cover. There is a temple along the Chinese shore, set this orb at the Dark Warrior's feet and leave a prayer marking his season and asking for his boon. The orb should remain in this shape if you do not mess with it, but should you drop it or lose it you will be killed, on the spot. You start now."

And with that, Kamui dropped the orb in front of her...an act that strongly recommended that the girl attempt to catch it. When she made contact with the orb, she would notice that it felt...strangely like nothing at all. There was almost no texture, no real feel to it, the only sensation that came from it was a sense of pressure, an externalizing force that let it be held...and the problems that came with it. To put a numeric value to the object, the item would feel like it weighed roughly 50kg, not impossible to carry for a supernatural human, but definitely difficult enough that the girl should not be able simply carry it to her destination.

"Oh right, and like any good mission, you even have a super secret hidden sub-objective. Locate it and you get bonus points! They don't matter, but you'd get them! Good luck, kid. If you need me, I'll be over in that tree, evading consciousness. I totally believe in you."

Kamui did a quick about face and hopped up in to the aforementioned tree and sprawled himself out on the branch, rather apparently no longer interested in her any longer, paying her no more mind than to idly wave his hand at her to shoo her off. That was a facade though, he'd be following her and fully planned to make this little adventure a living hell for her from the shadows, but she hardly needed to know that. If she managed to pass this little test, if she managed to accomplish her mission and survive, well, then he might just have the assignment for her. It was something he had needed done for awhile now and based on her personality thus far, she might be just what he needed.

Thea stared at the orb in front of her, both the remnants of the chi lenses she had earlier made, and her natural chi abilities told her that the ball was pretty damn powerful. She was a bit curious as to rather or not holding a thing like that with no natural chi abilities could actually burn someone like a raging flame would have the tendency to do. The amount of energy Kamui just expended without even breaking a sweat was just another feat to be added to Thea’s already impressively long list of reasons why she wanted him to teach her. The fact that he could make the ball the size of a mere baseball wasn’t even that much of a surprise after having created something of that power. Her mission on the other hand was a bit of a surprise.

She had to find a way to get to China. Even if China was land of both miracles, and dreams this would be a task of herculean proportions. Getting to China from Japan would at the very least require being one of the best swimmers in the world, or a ship, Then finding a shrine with the only instructions being the Chinese coast could take a year or two just to do a thorough enough search to make sure nothing was missed. This would be added onto the fact that the people who were in control of China probably wouldn’t be too fond of humans from Japan. Thea never paid a ton of attention to politics, but she knew enough to have doubts that anywhere would appreciate people from the earth’s last true safe area.

Her thoughts were shattered by the ball which was now a pretty good representation of her future, and her life was falling down to the ground. Her right hand swung out to grab the ball as her entire body feel forward. Her hand grasped around it as for the first time she felt the true weight of the orb in front of her. It hastened her fall to the ground and forced her to think a bit quickly if she didn’t want to be met with a face full of dirt, and stone. She used the weight of the ball, and it’s momentum by thrusting it to her side as fast as she could. She then used the few extra seconds she had to throw herself backwards enough to cause her to land on the ground first with her knees. She had slid a few inches closer to Kamui, and was currently on her now a bit pained knees, but she had the orb in her hand.

She got to her feet after that little stunt, and looked at the orb in her right hand. It was a bit heavier than she thought it would be, but as long as she rested enough then she should be fine with walking quite a bit each day. Her eyes went back to the direction that her home village was located in as she realised something. Almost anyone could probably tell what she was carrying, and if she didn’t want to be killed by someone who would like to have that kind of energy she would need to avoid any populated areas. Her head shifted to look directly north, a small grin appearing on her face as the challenge ha seemingly fully registered.

“A nearly impossible mission with vague instructions, and a requirement to stay alone just to make sure no one tries to steal my package. Best chance I have is to get to the northern coast when we’re about 50 miles away from it, and steal a ship I don’t know how to use, or navigate. Then find my way to china across the ocean, and search there coast while avoiding everyone who will naturally be trying to kill me for the multiple reasons that this will go wrong. On top of which I’ll have to constantly do everything one handed to keep the orb, and go without food, or water for long stretches of time. Every hour of sleep also increases my chances of dropping the orb, so exhaustion will be a risk.”

She began to make her way due north, using the knowledge of where she had existed ,and the fact that she had walked in a straight line to know which way to head. Before she disappeared into the trees, she turned to Kamui one last time.

“If what you teach me is anywhere near equal to the difficulty of what you have me do. This should be fun.”

Her smile didn’t fade as she started walking off to her destination. She wasn’t going to run to avoid getting exhausted much before she could afford to. Knowing what she did about the average human walking speed it should take her around ten hours of just walking to get where she needed to go. A glance down to her right hand which was currently clamped around the orb reminded her that she could probably last an half hour before her right arm was too sore to continue properly. She could switch to her left arm at that point, but her progress would be slow. As long as she made it to the coast in three days she should be fine, which meant an average of three and a third kilometers of walking per day. She would need to find some water by that point or start running the risk of dehydration. Considering she was in japan this should not be a hard challenge for her. She could force her body to stay awake for the three days with resting in between for her muscles commonly enough being necessary. The amount that a human body can do when pushed to it’s limits is amazing.

With all of this in mind her first hour of walking was planned out, and would be carried out to the T as long as nothing strange happened to stop her. She would find this shrine, and claim her new job in due time. Thea wouldn’t allow herself to be stopped.

"I can safely say it's not equal, what I aim to teach is far more difficult. If you develop creativity and flexibility to go along with that steadfast stubbornness, you'll quickly find that this task isn't difficult at all."

Kamui grinned and gave the girl one final wink before seemingly vanishing in to thin air. It wasn't movement, even with her limited ability she would be able to notice him moving away simply from the change in air pressure from his movement. No, this was Kamui legitimately vanishing in to thin air, like he was never truly there to begin with. Little Thea had already taken off however and she made it very clear that she was not all that interested in him until she managed to complete her task, as the girl had turned away from him entirely and stalked off in to the woods. Kamui put from her mind with nothing but her task in his place. It was admirable, and it was the real reason he had taken her. Stubbornness was essential, Kamui needed that stubbornness more than little Thea knew. If she proved just how stubborn she was by dragging that thing all the way to China, then she just might be who Kamui needed as his Dark Warrior.

Thankfully and luckily for little Thea, she would not run in to much trouble on the way to the half way point of her destination. Japan was, still for the most part, idyllic. Of all the places for someone to mindlessly pulse her energy like Saya had earlier, she picked the absolute best location to do so without getting herself eaten. The road she walked to this small town was virtually empty, nothing but the local wildlife to really offer company for her. It was without incident that she found herself in the village. It was a small village named rather appropriately "Merchant's Rest." It had been a rest stop for many merchants in days old and new ferrying goods to and from Karakura itself to the mainland. Even with super powers, people still needed ingredients to keep their food from tasting like cardboard and as such, shipping lanes were still a requirement.

As Thea approached the village, it would seem just as idyllic as the path she took to get there and as the waning hours of the day drove by, she'd see people in the last vestiges of their free time running around the village in a frenzy, rushing to finish the days work. It would not take her long to locate an Inn, should Thea be looking for it. In a town like this, Lodging establishments were one of the most integral sources of income. Everyone around was vibrant and full of life, from the couple to her left vehemently arguing about whether or not it was smarter to break their table down and reassemble it later or just try to force the whole thing through the door to the kids playing to her right, screaming about how his opponent's attacks had no effect on him because Shadin had blessed his armor and that the evil Shadowfall would never be able to touch him, Thea would be awash with life. It was the kind of place that would be perfect to sit and meditate on the nature of Chi and life itself. Of course, it would be if that was all that happened.

Every passing glance was thrown Thea's way as she would walk through the town, all of which were drawn to the ball in her hand. They were a small village, defenseless to any kind of aggressive action of super powered beings and one of the few places left in the world who could claim such. Seeing such energy coalesced in one place was terrifying to them, even the powerless among them could tell that the orb was a threat and were entirely unsure how to comport themselves in the face of this new visitor. Some left, some awkwardly tried to go about their business, some just stared with a confused and awestruck expression on their faces. The temperament of the village would sway drastically based upon the next twenty seconds, hopefully little Thea used them wisely.